Material Assumptions: Paper as Dialogue

Saturday, August 11

Center for Book & Paper Arts 1104 South Wabash Ave, Chicago, IL 60605

Hand papermaking is a process that begins with the raw material of pulp and ends in sculpture, mixed media, installation and beyond. So to us “handmadeness” points not to a certain aesthetic or visual trope, but to realms of possibility. As such, this exhibition is about the discursive ways that artists approach paper as a medium, technology, and tool, and the utility of paper at the site of interdisciplinary contemporary arts and crafts.

For the exhibition, we asked contemporary artists to create new work using abaca and cotton paper handmade to their specifications at the Center for Book and Paper Arts by graduate students. A second part of the exhibition features works created by artists in-residence at Dieu Donné, a New York-based non-profit artist workspace dedicated to the creation, promotion and preservation of contemporary art in the hand papermaking process.

The exhibition was organized as part of a curatorial studies independent study in the Interdisciplinary Arts Department, led by Melissa Potter, Acting Director, Book & Paper Program and Jessica Cochran, Curator of Exhibitions.